Atlas of Anomalous AI

by Ben Vickers (Editor), Kenric McDowell (editor)

Like a snake eating its tail, artificial intelligence exists in a circular relationship with its human creators.

The Atlas of Anomalous AI is a compelling and surprising map of our complex relationship to intelligence, from ancient to emerging systems of knowledge. A wildly associative constellation of ideas, stories, artworks and historical materials, the Atlas draws on art historian Aby Warburg’s Mnemosyne Atlas — an image map of the “afterlife of antiquity” — to approach the defining concepts of AI from an imaginative, artistic and revitalising perspective.

The Atlas presents a hyperdimensional view of the world, through a broad range of perspectives that explore the question of what AI has been and what it is becoming. Key texts on modelling, prediction and automation are brought together with stories of science fiction, dreams and human knowledge, set among visionary and surreal images.

Genres: Artificial Intelligence, Philosophy, Nonfiction, Technology, Design, Reference, Science

312 pages, Paperback

Published January 6, 2025

Reviews

[Benji · Rating 4 out of 5]

As AI begins to reveal its interiority, we may find that panpsychist and animist worldviews have built better maps and interfaces to the space of emergent intelligence than the narrow vernacular of Western philosophy and analytical inference. Perhaps this will catalyse awareness and recognition of another, older Deepmind experiment, which was recorded in the teachings of the Upanishads.

The task of revitalising our understanding of AI and reformulating our relationship with it is only at its advent.

[Larry Ggggggggggggggggggggggggg · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very important book.

[Francesco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Probably the most important book I've read in the last 2 to 3 years.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is truly radical from Ignota Books, asking us to reimagine AI in a way that challenges, rather than entrenches, existing power structures.